This disclosure relates generally to generating customized content.
The Internet provides access to a wide variety of resources. For example, video, audio, and Web pages are accessible over the Internet. These resources present opportunities for other content (e.g., advertising or non-advertising content, such as audio, video, or the like) to be provided with the resources. For example, a Web page can include slots in which content can be presented. Similarly, such slots can be part of television programming.
Slots can be allocated to content providers (e.g., advertisers). In some systems, a network can be used to allocate content to the slots based, e.g., on various factors relating to the content and the context in which it is to be presented. For example, the content can be allocated based, in part, on keywords input to a system, such as a search engine. An auction can be performed for the right to present advertising in a slot. In the auction, content sponsors provide bids specifying amounts that the content sponsors are willing to pay for presentation of their content. Typically, the winning bidder is given the right to present content.
Web site-based advertisements (“ads”) are sometimes presented to their advertising audience in the form of “banner ads”—e.g., a rectangular box that includes graphic components. When a member of the advertising audience (a “viewer”) selects one of these banner ads by clicking on it, embedded hypertext links typically direct the viewer to the advertiser's Web site.